Garden Harvest

Even though we cut back on the garden this year, we had a good crop of what we did plant. Also helped that the peach and nectarine trees were fully loaded even though they're only 4 years old. Plan is to plant 3 or 4 more fruit trees this fall and shift the garden to the lower part of the yard. 

Below are photos of what me and the kids picked this morning. I feel the sudden urge to make salsa.

Jalapeños are yummy. 

Jalapeños are yummy. 

Some different varieties of cherry tomatoes. 

Yummy!

Yummy!

And here are their big brothers and sisters. 

Big boys! 

Big boys! 

Salsa photos coming soon. 

Life in the Garden: Week 1

A view of our garden, after planting.

One of the things me and Marathon Girl both like to do is garden. At our old home, we had a small garden in the back yard. It was smaller than what we wanted but it was a small home with a small yard so we made do with what space we had. At our new place, the yard is roughly three times as big but since it was a new home, the yard wasn't done and there was no space or good ground for a garden. We've been saving up money in the (almost) two years since we've moved in order to get a yard that the kids can play in and a garden space for us. Over the last couple of weeks we've removed rocks, put in some good soil, and planted grass.

Saturday I (finally!) planted the first half of the garden. There are now rows of lettuce, beets, radishes, onions, cabbage, carrots, and Swiss chard. Basically I planted all the hardy and semi-hardy plants that need to start growing before the weather gets to warm. Next week we'll add tomato plants, peppers, squash, melons, beans, peas, and corn. Most of the veggies I planted we don't have a lot of experience growing. Most of them are an experiment to see what we can or can't grow well in this area. In our last home we learned what worked and what didn't and after our first year could generally plant year after year successfully. I'm just glad we have the space to try new things. If three-quarters of what we planted turns out, I'll consider this part of the garden a smashing success.